Agenda

Ongoing Session

April 18-May 31

One-Day Sessions

Wednesday, April 19

All Fired Up

1:15pm (RISD Metcalf Auditorium - Chace Center (RISD Museum), 20 North Main St):Keynote Address: Fire and Transformation in Early Modern European Art and Alchemy, Pamela Smith

Earth, Water, Air, and Fire were conceptual building blocks in early modern European views of nature, and, at the same time, fire was an everyday agent of transformation in all realms of early modern life, from quotidian charcoal making and other forms of utilitarian knowledge about fire and fuel, to metalworking practices, to the language of alchemical allegory. The lecture will survey these areas and focus in on the mental world of metalworkers whose work with fire involved a material network of transformative substances, including red pigments, blood, gold, and lizards.

RISD Glass initiated Hot Nights as a means of cultivating a greater understanding of glass and its significance to an array of disciplines. Through a series of hot shop demonstrations, projects, and workshops, Glass faculty and students partner with the larger community to research and experiment the intersection between glass and its ubiquitous presence in the world.

Monday, April 24

Fired Up: Wood-Fired Kiln Opening

12:00pm (The Steel Yard, 27 Sims Avenue)

Larry Bush, students from the RISD Ceramics Department, and the Steelyard Community have fired up the large wood-fired kiln at The Steel Yard. The wood-fired kiln is built inside a shipping container. Wood-kiln firing takes a full week. Visit at high noon on Monday, April 24th when the doors are opened and the material magic is revealed.

Thursday, April 27

Brown on Fire

3:00pm-4:00pm (IBES Foyer, 85 Waterman St):Poster Session

Sponsors: IBES and Department of History

Fire has existed on Earth since plants colonized the continents. A major phase change in its history occurred when a creature, ourselves, learned to exploit it deliberately and eventually assumed a species monopoly over its use. We got small guts and big heads because we learned to cook food. We went to the top of the food chain because we learned to cook landscapes. And now we've become a geologic force because we've begun to cook the planet. Today, the Earth divides into two grand realms of combustion - one that burns living landscapes and one that burns lithic ones. We now have too little of the right kind of fire, too much of the wrong kind, and too much combustion overall.

Reception and announcement of poster competition winners

Friday, April 28

The Americas and the Generative Power of Fire

Sponsors: IBES, Department of Anthropology and John Carter Brown Library

3:00pm (John Carter Brown Library):SymposiumModerator: Neil Safier Panelists:· Andrew Scherer, Ceremonies of Smoke and Flame among the Ancient Maya· Matt Liebmann, When the Little Firekeeper Ran Away: Pueblo People, Franciscan Missions, and Wildfires in 17th Century New Mexico· Guilhem Olivier: The New Fire Ceremony: Religion and Power in Ancient Central Mexico· Alessandra Russo, Fury and Beauty: Fire in the Limits of Conquest